30YearsWar: #4 - "The French Connection"

When Diplomacy Fails Podcast

Zack Twamley

Phd, International Relations, Korean War, European History, 17th Century, 18th Century, Politics, 20th Century, Thirty Years' War, History, 19th Century, War, First World War

4.8 • 773 Ratings

🗓️ 29 January 2020

⏱️ 31 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

The only connection you need is from your eyes to the pages, because we have a historical fiction series out NOW which will definitely be right up your street! Matchlock is set during the Thirty Years' War, beginning in 1622, when Matthew Lock lands in Europe to investigate the brutal murder of his parents.

Order your copy of Matchlock and the Embassy by clicking here.

This episode continues where we left off in the previous instalment, by delving deeper into the motives of the French King Henry IV, in the context of the ongoing Julich-Cleve Crisis. Would Henry intervene, thereby reigniting the war against Spain which had only come to an end in 1598? The answer was no, but not for lack of trying. At the last moment, Henry was assassinated in 1610, on the verge, perhaps, of a great rupture with the enemies of France. That rupture would have to wait fifteen years, as the Empire focused back in on itself. A major force in the Empire was plainly Maximilian, the Duke of Bavaria, and in this episode we get closer to grips with him, assessing his influence, his wealth and his power. Much of these qualities were enhanced, as we will see, thanks to his relationship with the Habsburgs. If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em, or in Maximilian’s case – marry them! The Bavarian-Imperial arrangement was to prove mutually beneficial to both sides, and effectively carried the Thirty Years War forwards, and we investigate it here.

Important though Bavaria was, the Emperor would have been utterly lost without his Habsburg brethren, the King of Spain, on hand for a handy loan of money or the occasional lending of a whacking large army of professionals. Unfortunately for the King of Spain Philip III, his kingdom was at war with the Dutch, or at least it had been, until an unlikely mediator, the assassinated King of France, helped bring it to a temporary end. The Twelve Years Truce paused the war with the Dutch, but it did not relieve Spain completely from the burdens which were to follow. Europe seemed to be moving into two distinct camps – one Habsburg, and one against that great dynasty. Only time could tell what consequences might follow…

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Transcript

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0:00.0	You're listening to When Diplomacy Fells'E
0:12.6	On the Thirty Years' War, Episode 4
0:16.8	Here we Thanks for. Thanks. Thanks to the complicated and contradictory rulings on inheritance, which were laid down in the 1555 piece of Augsburg,
0:49.8	the death of a childless ruler in Europe always led to concerns that things might just get out of
0:55.8	hand. The death of the ruling Duke of Eulich-Kleve-Berg, three united duchies in a strategically
1:02.7	important position in Europe, right at the time when the Protestants and Catholics had
1:07.2	placed themselves into armed leagues, seemed like the spark to light the
1:11.6	tinderbox, which had been swelling with flammable material since the middle of the 16th century.
1:17.4	In this episode, we see how that succession crisis drew in not just princes of the empire,
1:23.8	but also the interests of the Dutch and Spanish, who were then fighting their own 80 years' war,
1:29.3	and the French, led by King Henry IV, who had his own plans for the Hasburgs in both corners of the continent.
1:40.3	Eulik Cleve had created the latest theatre where all of the continent's elements could stand in opposition to their enemies and in league with their allies.
1:50.0	The French, cooperating with the Dutch, and the Habsbergs, with both branches cooperating together, argued for different candidates to succeed the lucrative but disunited duchies, which stretched across the Dutch
2:01.9	border. With the Hausbergs selecting a Catholic candidate, predictably enough, and the Franco-Dutch
2:07.9	camp selecting a Protestant one, the religious and constitutional tensions endured by
2:12.9	German princes within the Holy Roman Empire seemed to have been brought out onto the stage of European
2:18.1	politics. It was all connected. The antagonism felt by the Dutch and French towards Spain
2:23.6	had compelled them to choose a candidate which would not benefit Madrid. Henry IV of France
2:29.3	certainly didn't want to see the Spanish expand their influence and land portfolio in such a sensitive
2:35.0	region, and although the Dutch had been in the process of negotiating a peace with the Spanish
2:40.0	from 1609, Dutch officials were wholly opposed to the Spanish installing themselves along
2:46.0	their southern border for very obvious reasons.
	...

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